


The Curious Case of Alisa Shevchenko

by longtailwriter



Category: Alisa Shevchenko - Fandom, Hunger Games Trilogy - Suzanne Collins, Sherlock (TV)
Genre: F/M, M/M, Multi
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-02-17
Updated: 2017-03-10
Packaged: 2018-09-25 05:46:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,073
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9805226
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/longtailwriter/pseuds/longtailwriter
Summary: John Watson and Sherlock Holmes investigate the curious case of Alisa Shevchenko and her connection to Russian hacker groups Shaltay Boltay and GRIZZLY STEPPE. The group find themselves attacked, censored and character assassinated, eventually retreating to the fanfic community in an attempt to tell a highly coded version of their experiences. Katniss Everdeen features in flashbacks several chapters in.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [thisisforyou](https://archiveofourown.org/users/thisisforyou/gifts).



## Part One

####  **The Curious Case of Alisa Shevchenko**

"I have never made a secret of my distaste for forks" said Sherlock, with a complex sort of smile.

"What in the hells are you talking about Holmes?" said Watson, in an uncouth way.

"I'm talking about forks, Watson," Sherlock lied, "and the quote is from Hemingway. Though ghost-written, I believe."

"Oh," said Watson. "Then I suppose it's probably a good quote."

"Mostly certainly," said Holmes. "A very good quote indeed. One of the finest in the English language."

Holmes tapped out the contents of his pipe into his hand and then poured the ash into Watson's upward facing palm. Watson looked at him, aghast. Holmes continued.

"Now, if you'll excuse me we really need to talk about Alisa Shevchenko."

"You mean Alisa Esage," Watson said with a look of a proud dog who's just finished pooing. Holmes ignored the smell.

"The Russian spy?"

Sherlock gave Watson a look of loving disdain.

"Yes yes, whatever you say Watson. The problem is I'm not entirely sure if the person who runs her Twitter account really is her anymore. And we need to find out where she is."

"I see," replied Watson. "How will we do that? I suppose I could put out a trace on her IP address and maybe set her webcam to switch on remotely..."

"Oh, no Watson," said Holmes, "that won't work at all. We'll need to start with her grammar."

"Or," continued Watson, deep in thought, "we could go onto her Instagram and cross-reference any new pictures with one of those location triangulators they have at the MET. The ones that use the image information to figure out weather, air pressure, things like that."

"Nope. Because I got most of London banned from her Instagram."

"How did you manage that, Holmes?"

"Quite simple really, I tried to install her as head of Шалтай Болтай."

"Humpty Dumpty?" said Watson, instinctively translating the Russian outloud.

Holmes paused a little while to let the information sink in.

"Yes, quite."

"Pardon?"

"I have a flight booked to Twitter HQ and we have to be there in an hour, so you're coming with me."

"Shaltay Boltay, are you certain?"

"Yes."

"Then I suppose I am. Coming with you, I mean. Yes, I suppose I am."

...

The plane journey took much longer than Watson was expecting. He had been thinking a lot about the case but didn't want to let Holmes know he had any real information or hunches. This was mainly because he was trying to avoid trampling on Holmes' feelings. He had been secretly thinking about the competition element of their relationship, which he had always been aware of, but had never been entirely sure how to place himself within. He thought that they had become too intense, and had taken on an aspect he was not entirely comfortable with. Though of course he would never let on, he found himself wondering if perhaps Sherlock was homosexual. He thought that he shouldn't mind but when he was honest with himself maybe he did.

Sometimes Watson thought about looping his arms around Sherlock's toned, masculine waist and wanking him off silently. He didn't much like the thought, but still he could not entirely erase it from his mind. Other times Watson would lay in bed at night and he'd feel the phantom impression of Holmes' penis against his buttocks, and then inside the soft tissued circle of his anus. He didn't much like that thought either, and sometimes when he looked at Sherlock's admittedly extremely attractive, almost alienly pretty features, he found the images flooding involuntarily into his mind and he felt violated. Violated by the mere presence of his oldest friend without whom... without whom there would be no adventure or intrigue? No, that wasn't true. He alway knew he could make his own...

"Gizza kiss love."

The phrase drew Watson from his contemplation with a jump that was not unlike the jolt of an aircraft taking off, though of course he was already on one, so the metaphor became confusing.

The voice was coming from an elderly lady two seats in front of him. She had been relaying the story of the first ever interaction she had with her now husband.

"I'm being absolutely truthful with you now, Anne. He walked right up to me in the street and said 'Gizza kiss love'. As if he didn't feel any shame at all. I told him to get lost of course, and he didn't try to follow me or anything like that, so it wasn't actually creepy. But afterwards we were walking back down by the beach again and I bumped into him. Literally bumped into. He said he was sorry and..."

Watson lost interest in the conversation at this point and turned to Holmes.

"Do you know why you want to find Alisa Shevchenko? I mean, no-one's paying you, are they? And you really don't have any other reason to be chasing after her. It might come across as..." As the elderly lady had just used the word it was fresh in his mind so he used it too: "a bit creepy?"

Holmes seemed on edge, deeply offended and barely trying to hide it, he snapped.

"Yes, thank you Watson. I'm pretty bloody aware of how it might seem thank you very fucking much."

Holmes slammed his fist down on the table. Watson, taken aback, did not respond.

"Do you ever think for one fucking second about the effect your pretty little insinuations and stupid remarks might be having? I want to find out because I'm interested. In her, in Shaltay Boltay, in the whole bloody thing. Because I don't want to waste my entire fucking life with you acting like I'm some bloody retarded autist you have to tip-toe around all the time just because you want to be fucking "likable"! Because you want to be safe and dependable while I have to always be the fucking crazy wingnut."

Watson took a swig of the complimentary airline gin a little too quickly, then bit down very subtly too hard on the olive standing naked on the cocktail stick above it.

"It's not that I don't _like_ you Watson. It's just I think we should see other people. Professionally, interpersonally, in an investigative sense, you know."

Watson did not know. He looked blankly, but not stupidly at Sherlock. Who seemed suddenly calmer, more composed.

"Look, I'm sorry..."

"For what? What have you done wrong?" Sherlock seemed suddenly and strangely angry again, and Watson could not quite fathom why. "You don't even know what's going on in the background, Watson. You don't know what they've been doing to me, to my reputation, to everything. Moriarty doesn't _stop_ John, ever. He's always fucking there. Obsessive, cold, impossible to deny. If you don't counter every move he's always there with his words... Creepy, crazy, nasty, vicious, all of them. He'll use them over and over. He'll take anything you say or do and he'll make it wrong, evil, bad because that's how he sees himself. And you can't change him, you can't make him better, you can't convince him of the error of his ways because he... because he just _is_ , and he's obsessed with _me_ John, with _me!_ Don't you see it?"

"No, Sherlock," replied Watson, in a tone that implied quiet and unpleasant judgement, "I don't think I see at all."

Watson felt the wheels of the plane touch down on the tarmac of St Helena International Airport, a small strip laid over the dust and sand of the remote British colony, so close to the coastline that it had already been flooded three times that year. It suddenly occurred to him that Twitter Headquarters was in California.

"Wait, Holmes, why are we in St Helena?"

"Because Alisa Shevchenko's here." Holmes said this without a hint of guilt or embarrassment.

"You fucking fool."

Watson almost spoke the thought aloud but he restrained himself. Instead he began to collect his belongings.

"John look. It's not your fault. I just. I need to change, that's all. And while you're still here I can't. You always need me to be the same Sherlock and I'm not him anymore. I'm just not. This one last case and then it's over. It has to be."

Watson continued packing. They didn't speak for the rest of the night, and Holmes insisted they take rooms on opposite sides of the hotel. For safety, he said.

...

The woman at the police station seemed distressed.

"No, but what if you tracked it back afterwards and realised it was rape?"

The heavy-set, stern but kindly looking policeman seemed confused but at least partially sympathetic.

"I don't think that..."

"I mean I did track it back is what I mean. But what I'm saying is afterwards I realised it was rape."

"So you were raped? You didn't give consent at the time?"

"No, yes... I didn't want to."

"Did you tell him you didn't want to? Did you say no?"

The woman paused for several seconds before seeming to arrive at a conclusion.

"Yes," said the woman.

The heavy-set policeman motioned to a female officer who came over to the lady, placed her hands gently and comfortingly on her shoulders and wordlessly escorted her towards an interview room to take a statement.

Sherlock turned to Watson.

"I'm not sure if this is a good idea. What would I even say?"

"Just let them know you're here and why," said Watson.

"Just waltz up there and say..."

"Mr Holmes." The police officer at the desk called his name. Sherlock stood and walked up to the desk.

"Hi." Holmes looked awkward.

"I'm a sort of... amateur detective. I solve crimes for a hobby and..." Sherlock looked to Watson for support, who pretended not to have seen him at all.

"Go on..." The policeman said this with a note of suspicion.

"My colleage here said I should report in, so we can get support if anything goes wrong."

"I see..." The policeman took a sip of tea with an overly deliberate motion, to show Sherlock he was very much in the process of considering something he might eventually not find to his liking. "We can't provide access to any police databases or information, and we can't provide backup... Wait, you said... Sherlock Holmes, right?"

"Yes, but..."

"Wait here." The policeman barked this in a manner that made Sherlock want to do exactly as the man said. The policeman walked over to another desk, just behind, carrying a file and began speaking to two other policemen in hushed and slightly urgent tones. It appeared there was some disagreement. At length he returned.

"You're an... interesting man, Mr Holmes. Your friend: Doctor Watson, is that correct?"

"Yes... I... how..."

"We hope you're not quite the man some people seem to think you are, Mr Holmes, but we're glad you're with the doctor, at any rate. If you're here about the Shaltay Boltay case specifically we won't interfere, but we will absolutely not intervene on your behalf if there are any problems. I understand the London MET and associated police forces have in the past. We don't hold with that here. In our eyes anyone who decides to investigate crime for no apparent reward usually has other motivations, and I can't say I entirely trust yours. Also, there are elements of the secret service, CIA, GCHQ and a few others who are likely to be interested in anything to do with Shaltay Boltay and even if we wanted to give you support with them it's just not something we're equipped to do."

"I understand that officer... I..."

"We're glad you came to see us, I will admit. There's quite a story surrounding you, if I believe the files, and I am fairly sure I do, but if you get into any trouble, if you even come close to something that might be seen as breaking the law we won't hesitate to support anyone bringing charges." 

"I understand officer." Sherlock turned and began walking towards the door. The officer returned to sipping at his now luke-warm tea. Just before leaving, Sherlock turned again:

"It may come as a surprise, but judging by the upturned corner of that file someone's added a page or two in the last few hours. I don't suppose you'd noticed that yet..."

By the time the officer looked up from his tea, Sherlock had already left the building.

...

It was 3:15pm when Moriarty checked into the doctor's office. The wait was at least an hour but the look on Moriarty's face was one of quiet anticipation rather than outright boredom. People with various ailments coughed and wheezed, and a young girl played half-heartedly with a set of building blocks on the floor of the waiting room.

"Doctor Wilkinson will see you now... Mori... er... Professor."

The woman looked at Moriarty with the learned kindness of a veteran of her profession, but a look that nonetheless carried with it a slight edge of irritation, and pity coloured her outwardly sympathetic demeanor.

"Have you been feeling any better?"

"Not since the operation. I'm disabled now, you know. It takes some getting used to."

"Well, you seem much better anyway", said the nurse. Professor Moriarty supposed this was meant to sound curt, but in fact seemed more tender than the lady's initial greeting.

"Also," Moriarty continued, "I found a lump, and I've come to renew my prescription for the pills." 

"Of course, come this way."

"Oh, hi M... R... Professor Moriarty." The doctor was a youngish male, with a dark, slightly asian complexion and a weary look in his eye. "I suppose you'll be needing more of the Zoloft."

Moriarty looked weary as well. "Yes. But it's more than that. There's other things, my knee after the operation. And I've found a lump on my chest that wasn't there last week... also there's been lot of stress... I think... I think someone's trying to kill me."

"Are you certain?"

"Yes, well, I think so. It's this crazy man; he thinks he solves crimes and now he's convinced he's in the secret service and he thinks... he thinks I told this woman and I think he's in love with her!"

The words spilled out of Moriarty's mouth like Tesco bubbly wine that's been shaken a little too much after being removed from the fridge.

"I see," said the doctor, clearly not at all impressed. Professor Moriarty scrambled to respond.

"No, I mean really, it was Sherlock Holmes!"

The doctor's expression changed immediately to one of worry and concern. "Oh. I see. Is there anything else I can do to help?

"Yes doctor. Please. My knee first. I think something's wrong with it again. Could you have a bit of a look and maybe feel and see if everything's alright?"

Moriarty drew the trouser-hem right up past the knee, exposing bruised flesh. "There, doctor, right there."


	2. Moriarty

Moriarty put her clothes back on, then those of the doctor and exited the office. She hoped very much that the doctor was dead, and was not still half alive like a number of her other victims. Though in a lot of ways she found she wanted the suffering, to see her victim suffer greatly, and for a long time. That man had liked it, touching her exposed breast like some disgusting predator. He'd liked it. It was sick, wrong how much he'd enjoyed it, so she had to do something to get even. They never believed you when you told people what they were like, usually. They'd have called her a liar, or worse, most of them. Though Moriarty had become very adept at finding the ones who'd believe her, and letting her first tender kindlings spark forest fires that raged for months, even years afterwards. The trick, she'd learned, was to research first, and do so thoroughly. The longer you could hold back the hunger for revenge, the better, and she certainly did hunger for revenge against Sherlock Holmes and his sickening *doctor* friend. *Doctor* ugh disgusting, she thought, and the word *disgusting* echoed in her mind for some time after. But she couldn't tell people why she really hated them. They'd never listen if she told them that. So instead what she did was she found the people who hated her target most, and encouraged their hatred. Then slowly she connected them together, one by one. She read blog posts by him, spoke with others at length about past events in his life, read Holmes' poetry, prose, looked at all his artworks and the products of his many other hobbies he splashed all over the internet as if he had no shame or concern for what should and should not be allowed to be made publicly available and how people might be affected by the sick, disordered ramblings of his sick, disordered mind. Sometimes she spoke to Holmes as well, in secret. Or got other people to do so while she watched them. Sometimes she'd have him subtly tortured by aquaintances who knew a thing or two about psychology. And the absurb fool was stupid enough to snap, to shout, become angry, and then she had him! Ha! The foul-mouthed academic and her the wounded party! It was perfect. So utterly perfect. She had all the evidence she needed now, after she'd waited months in cold fury, planning it out. All Holmes ever did was react on instinct and vastly overplay his occasional lucky guesses. But she knew _exactly_ what she was doing and that was why she'd win, she told herself. Holmes didn't stand a chance.

"Good evening Dr Reid," said the police officer to Moriarty. "You're looking much better today. How're you holding up after the baby trauma?"

A little makeup and some tricks with the hair and this moron couldn't even tell the difference. Moriarty demurred.

"Why would I not be holding up, officer?"

"Well, it's still not been long since the miscarriage. I'm surprised you came back into work at all. I know it was difficult for you."

Moriarty wracked her brains in an attempt to understand how this doctor would react, and how best to extract herself from the situation. What grains of similarity could she find between her own life and that of the doctor? She chanced a mid-flow switch in roles.

"It's been pretty awful, truth be told. You know a woman came in today and she's being stalked by Sherlock Holmes!"

"You mean, that sad, frumpy one I saw yesterday evening? The married one who always makes you touch her knee."

Moriarty kept her cool.

"Truth be told, I kind of enjoyed it," said Moriarty. "The woman's a bit of a tart but I like the shape of her legs. Almost made me hard."

The police officer's eyes widened and Moriarty very suddenly realised the depth of her mistake, but again she kept her cool. Before the officer could speak she switched tack.

"Locker-room talk probably not appropriate in the professional environment. Need to watch myself."

"Very much so," said the police officer with a tone of bewildered distaste.

Moriarty winked very slightly, so you wouldn't have been certain she was really winking at all. Then capitalised on the officers bewilderment to quickly and deftly change the subject again.

"Do you like puppies, officer?"

"I suppose...???" the officer replied.

"I do very much. I have a large collection of animal memes and a lot of the stuff on failblog is particularly funny."

"I can't say I..."

"Know them, no. I didn't think you were the type..." Moriarty paused for effect. "Well, I can't think what to talk about now so I'll get going. Things to do."

She walked off, leaving the officer with a strong feeling he didn't like this Dr Reid at all. This suited Moriarty just fine, and she chuckled a little to herself as she walked away. Towards the airport.

Moriarty had booked herself a flight to St Helena.

...

The next morning Watson was in a bad mood, as if he'd slept on the wrong side of the bed. A little like that anyway...

"I was thinking about you," said Watson. "Last night, just a little bit, about what you said. I guess you need my support right now, huh?"

Holmes closed his eyes and nodded his head forward slightly, and smiled a pained smile.

"A little bit Watson, yes." He sighed. "How long have we known each other now?"

"About 7 or 8 years I think."

"You know, I think for me sometimes it feels like a year and sometimes just a matter of hours. Do you think we've really got to know each other at all."

Watson looked slighlty pained. "Probably not."

"Sherlock," he continued, "do you ever think that maybe Moriarty I mean, I know he's evil, and a mastermind and all those things..." 

"She" corrected Sherlock, but without any particular heart or conviction.

"His daughter? Oh, I thought you meant the original Moriarty. On the plane I could have sworn you said "he"."

"It could be both right now. All I get to start with is a feeling, like a tingling, or a glimpse of something out of the corner of your eye. That's what happens when my mind starts processing clues to something in the background. This time first it told me something was very, very wrong. And then, quite subtly, it told me _Moriarty_ but nothing more. So it could be one or the other, or as I said it might be both... It might be more than I can deal with this time."

They fell silent for a while, and Watson considered the care-warn lines along Sherlock's face and the noble shimmer in his eyes, as if a he'd lived a thousand years in the space of time most men live ten. He'd begun to think he didn't believe in genius, that all men and women were essentially the same, just with different skills and talents. Now he looked into Sherlock's beautiful, sad, lonely eyes, and he changed his mind. This man was a genius after all, and whatsmore he was his friend. Or perhaps instead, they now had the chance to truly become friends, to start over. To drop the jousting and the trading quips, and just be there for each other, as partners as... l...

Watson pushed the thought from his mind. Sherlock and John walked slowly from the hotel and for a minute or maybe two, Sherlock placed his head on John's shoulder.

"I really am so very tired John," said Sherlock.

"I know, Holmes, I know." John kissed him once on the side of his face, just along the line of his beautiful dark hair. And it didn't feel wrong or bad or weird anymore. It felt ok. Nice even.

...

The two were just about to reach town, where they were going to shop for some supplies to keep them going while they stayed at the hotel. A particular brand of toiletries John liked, which the hotel did not provide, and some sandlewood candles Sherlock said helped him to think when he was decyphering a case.

As they were walking, a familiar figure appeared, ducking out of the shadows right in front of them. She was wearing a red shawl, and a pair of sunglassses which she pulled down to the bridge of her nose to share fixedly at Holmes with dark, brown, facinatingly terrifying eyes. A small chain looped around her shoulder suspended a 2/3 lifesize model of an albatross with an eye-patch just in front of the woman's midrift. It swung gently and rhythmically from side to side as she stood silent an almost inhumanly still, her stance perfectly combining feminity and dangerous power, a combination that utterly and instantaniously captivated Holmes. The woman was Alisa Shevchenko.

"Have you had the chance to see anymore more dreams about me?" She asked, as pointly and as seductively as if she were standing before them in her nightdress, holding a loaded revolver, the soft outline of her breasts very subtly uncovered beneath her clothes in a manner that said both "I dare you" and "you can't" undeniably at the very same time.

"Dreams about you?"

"You don't have to pretend Sherlock. Professor Moriarty's been telling me everything there is to know about you. It seems you've been a very, very naughty boy."


End file.
